Book I, LECTOR OF Wanley's send up a list of his out-of-course books, out of which my Lord may pick and choose any twenty of them gratis. . . I am also to advise that he is heartily willing and ready to serve LEIAN MSS. his Lordship in any library matters; . . particularly with [Sir John] OSBORNE of Chicksand Abbey, where most part of the old monastical library is said yet to remain.' And again, on another occasion My Lord was pleased to tell me that Mr. GIBSON's last parcel of printed books were all his own as being gained into [the bargain with] the two last parcels of manuscripts bought of him.' GIBSON's protest that he was entitled to an additional thirty pounds was quite in vain. Diary, vol. i, pp. 13, 21. 1720, February. Ib., vol. ii, f. 24. Of the innumerable skirmishes between librarian and bookseller which WANLEY'S pages record with loving detail, two passages may serve as sufficient samples :'VAN HOECK, a Dutchman,' he writes in 1722, brought to my Lord a small parcel of modern manuscripts, and their lowest prices, which proved so abominably wicked that he was sent away with them immediately.' And, in February, 1723-BOWYER, the bookseller, came intreating me to instruct him touching the prices of old editions, and of other rare and valuable books, pretending that thereby he should be the better able to bid for them; but, as I rather suppose, to be better able to exact of gentlemen. I pleaded utter inexperience in the matter, and, without a quarrel, in my mind rejected this ridiculous attempt with the scorn it deserved. This may be a fresh instance of (the truth of TULLIE's paradox, "that all fools are mad.” Wanley's Diary, vol. i, f. 73, verso. MS. Lansd., In the year 1720, large additions were made, more especially to the historical treasures of the Harleian Library, by the purchase of manuscripts from the several collections of John WARBURTON (Somerset Herald), of Archdeacon BATTELY, and of Peter SEGUIER (Chancellor of France). Another important accession came, in the same ar, by the bequest of Hugh THOMAS. In 1721 purchases ere made from the several libraries of Thomas GREY, cond Earl of STAMFORD; of Robert PAYNELL, of Belaugh, Norfolk; and of John ROBARTES, first Earl of RADNOR. BOOK I, Chap. V. THE COL LECTOR OF THE HAR- Ibid., pp. 35, 42, 48. DEATH OF Lord OXFORD died on the 21st May, 1724, at the age sixty-three. WANLEY records the event in these words: t pleased God to call to His mercy Robert, Earl of XFORD, the founder of this Library, who long had been to OXFORD. e a munificent patron.' you LORD in Works, vol. xvi, p. 438. When condoling with the new Earl upon his father's ath, SWIFT wrote to him:-'You no longer wanted his Corresp.. re and tenderness, . . . but his friendship and convertion will ever want, because they are qualities so rare the world, and in which he so much excelled all others. has pleased me, in the midst of my grief, to hear that preserved the greatness, the calmness, and intrepidity, his mind to his last minutes; for it was fit that such a e should terminate with equal lustre to the whole progress it.' It is honourable alike to the man who was thus nerously spoken of, and to the friend who mourned his s, that the testimony so borne was a consistent testimony. e failings of HARLEY were well known to SWIFt. In e days of prosperity they had been freely blamed; and e to face. When those days were gone, the good qualis only came to be dwelt upon. To the unforgiving emy, as to the bereaved son, SWIFT wrote about the rits of the friend he had lost. I pass over that paraph of your letter,' said BOLINGBROKE, in reply, which kind of an elegy on a departed minister.' When the Harleian Library was inherited by the second l of OXFORD (of this family) it included more than six BOOK I, Chap. V. THE COL LECTOR OF THE HAR THE HAR LEIAN LI BRARY BY EDWARD, EARL OF OXFORD. 1724-1741. See MS. Addit., 5338. (B. M.) thousand volumes of Manuscripts, in addition to about fourteen thousand five hundred charters and rolls. By him it was largely augmented in every department. He LEIAN MSS. made his library most liberally accessible to scholars; and INCREASE OF when, by a purchase made in Holland, he had acquired some leaves of one of the most precious biblical manuscripts in the world-leaves which had long before been stolen from the Royal Library at Paris-he sent them back to their proper repository in a manner so obliging as made it apparent that his sense of the duties of collectorship was as keen as was his sense of its delights. At his death, on the 16th of June, 1741, the volumes of manuscripts had increased to nearly eight thousand. The printed books were estimated at about fifty thousand volumes, exclusive of an unexampled series of pamphlets, amounting to nearly 400,000, and comprising, like the manuscripts, materials for our national history of inestimable value. The only daughter and heiress of the second Earl, Margaret, by her marriage with William, Duke of PORTLAND, carried her share in a remnant of the fortunes of the several families of CAVENDISH, HOLLES, and HARLEY, into the family of BENTINCK. The magnificent printed library which formed part of her inheritance was sold and dispersed. It was of that collection that JOHNSON said, 'It excels any library that was ever yet offered to sale in the value as well as Works, vol. v, in the number of the volumes which it contains.' Johnson, Account of the Harleian Library; p. 181. THE PURCHASE OF THE HAR LEIAN MSS. FOR THE The Manuscripts were eventually purchased by Parliament for the sum of ten thousand pounds. With reference to this purchase the Duchess of PORTLAND wrote as follows, in April, 1753, to the Speaker of the House of Commons: As soon as I was acquainted with the proposal you had made in the House of Commons, in relation to my Father's Collection of Manuscripts I informed my Mother [the then Dowager Countess of OXFORD] of it, who has given the Duke of PORTLAND and me full power to do herein as we shall think fit. BOOK I, THE COL Chap. V. LECTOR OF THE HAR 'Though I am told the expense of collecting them was LEIAN MSS. mmense, and that, if they were to be dispersed, they would probably sell for a great deal of money, yet, as a sum has een named, and as I know it was my Father's and is my Mother's intention that they should be kept together, I will not bargain with the Publick. I give you this trouble herefore to acquaint you that I am ready to accept of your roposal upon condition that this great and valuable Col-ction shall be kept together in a proper repository, as an Idition to the Cotton Library, and be called by the name the Harleian Collection of Manuscripts. 'I hope you do me the justice to believe that I do not nsider this as a sale for an adequate price. But your ea is so right, and so agreeable to what I know was ather's intention, that I have a particular satisfaction in ntributing all I can to facilitate the success of it.' L Duchess of Arthur Portland to my Onslow; Ms. Addit., If it were possible to give, in few words, any adequate ew of the obligations which English literature, and more Decially English historical literature, owes to the Collectors the Harleian Manuscripts, there could be no fitter consion to a biographical notice of Robert HARLEY. Here, vever, no such estimate is practicable. Nor, in truth, it be needed in order to convince the reader that 'some pute of veneration'-to use the apposite words which INSON prefixed to the Harleian Catalogue-is due to the our of the two HARLEYS for literature; and to that erous and exalted curiosity which they gratified with essant searches and immense expense; and to which dedicated that time and that superfluity of fortune 17521, f. 30. (B. M.) Book I, LECTOR OF LEIAN MSS. which many others, of their rank, employ in the pursuit of contemptible amusements or the gratification of guilty passions." Edin. Iter, vol. Ixil, pp. 18, 19, NOTE TO CHAPTER V. EXTRACTS FROM THE STUART PAPERS, REFERRING TO 1. [1717?] A document which, could it be recovered, would go far towards clearing up some of the uncertainties which exist as to Lord Oxford's intercourse with the Pretender and his agents, subsequently to the death of Queen Anne, was seen by Sir James Mackintosh among the Stuart Papers acquired by George the Fourth. It was afterwards vainly searched for by Lord Mahon, when engaged upon his History of England, from the Peace of Utrecht. It is still known only from the cursory notes made by Mackintosh, and referred to by a writer in the Edinburgh Review in these words: 'During Oxford's confinement in the Tower there is a communication from him to the Pretender, preserved among the Stuart Papers, offering his services and advice; recommending the Bishop of Rochester as the fittest person to manage Jacobite affairs,-the writer himself being in custody; and adding that he should never have thought it safe to engage again with His Majesty if Bolingbroke himself had been still about him.' the 2. 1717. September 29. Bishop ATTERBURY to Lord MAR :Your accounts of what has been said here concerning some imaginary differences abroad have not so much foundation as you may suppose. At least, if they have, I am a stranger to it. The result of any discourse I shall have with [the Earl of Oxford ?] will be sure to reach you by his means. You will, I suppose, have a full account of affairs Tapers, 1717. here from his and other hands.' Mear! 3. [1717 P] The same to the same. Distances and other accidents have, for some years, interrupted my correspondence with [the Earl of Oxford ?] but I am willing to renew it, and to enter into it upon a better foot than it has ever yet stood, being convinced that my so doing may be of no small consequence to the |
